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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24933877">and they lived</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/jdphoenix/pseuds/jdphoenix'>jdphoenix</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, F/M, Fluff</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-06-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 06:47:08</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,418</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24933877</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/jdphoenix/pseuds/jdphoenix</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Under the effects of some pain meds, Jemma makes a confession. It's not the one she needs to make though.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Will Daniels/Jemma Simmons</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>26</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>and they lived</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It’s a shock coming into the infirmary. For what seems like the first time since he got here, none of Jemma’s team are hanging around.</p><p>Then it hits him that they don’t <em>need</em> to be around when Jemma’s not even here. She’s getting some sort of procedure done. The kind with cameras and places no human should ever see. The docs got that far describing it before Jemma patted his arm and told him it was routine thing, just checking to be sure her recent nausea wasn’t anything more serious.</p><p>(It’s Jemma, so Will wants to believe her. She’s never been wrong before. Doesn’t make it any easier to shake that sick feeling he has like when he found her moaning in pain because he “poisoned her food.” If she’s sick from something he gave her on the planet…)</p><p>With her still off getting whatever done, her team’s got no reason to hang around watching him like hawks and Will’s got the place to himself.</p><p>He pulls back the curtain around his bed and leaves it open. After literal years of alone time, he wouldn’t think he’d care for it, but it turns out he’s used to it. People—especially the crowd that likes to hover around Jemma—put him off. But he’ll sacrifice a little privacy if it means seeing her as soon as she comes back.</p><p>When he and Jemma first got back to Earth there was a lot of grumbling about how her team had planned for one person in need of serious recuperation, not two. Otherwise they would’ve put them in separate rooms from the start. But either Jemma’s just that loved around here she got the big room or her team were smart enough to realize they needed one this size to keep from crushing each other when they all inevitably piled in, so there was plenty of space for a second bed. At least until they got another room outfitted properly, they said. That’s when Jemma piped up that it was no hardship to share, after months together they’d both probably sleep better with the other nearby.</p><p>And that’s when the predatory gazes <em>really</em> started coming Will’s way.</p><p>Not that he minds too much when he wakes up in the dead of night and knows from the sound of her breathing Jemma’s just a few feet away.</p><p>In fact…</p><p>It may not be the dead of night but a peek behind her curtain reveals Jemma did beat him back. She’s curled up on her side, dead to the world. She’s pale too—normal enough for someone who hasn’t seen the sun in six months, but he thinks this paleness is a little more than that.</p><p>She’s just so peaceful in a way she never was on that other world, like she’s realizing she’s finally safe again.</p><p>Or like she’s sleeping off the drugs.</p><p>Either way, he can’t help exploiting the privacy of the moment to touch her cheek.</p><p>They haven’t talked about this. Them. Mostly because of her ever-present team but part of it too is he’s afraid. All she ever wanted was to get back to Earth and her team. All he wanted… Well, he never let himself hope before, no reason to start now.</p><p>Besides, he knows how that conversation’s gonna go and he’s not ready to hear her tell him it was all a summer romance, there for a season, gone once real life reasserts itself. She loves him and she’s grateful, but she thinks they should just be friends. They’ll always have Hell. Et cetera. Et cetera.</p><p>She’s not as asleep as he thought. Her eyes flutter open while he strokes her cheek, glassy and slow to focus.</p><p>“Oh,” she says, the word tripping out like she had to make a run up to it. “Hi.”</p><p>He smiles at the slight druggy slur in her voice. It’s ridiculous how cute he thinks it is. He speaks softly to avoid shattering her dreamy state and leans down close so she can better hear him. “Hey. How’re you feeling?”</p><p>Her eyes narrow, like his movements bring him out of focus and she has to wait for her eyes to adjust. “Nooooooo,” she moans, slamming a fist—with all the force of an irate toddler—into her pillow and burying her face next to it. “No no no!”</p><p>He drops to one knee beside her bed and does a quick scan of her body. She doesn’t sound like she’s in pain but it never hurts to check. She doesn’t look it either. She’s writhing around, twisting her knees and hips and torso. If she’s hurting, she’s only making it worse.</p><p>“What’s wrong? Hey. Jem.” He catches her hand when she lifts it to slam it down again. “Tell me what to do.”</p><p>She scowls at him. “You already did it,” she pouts. “You <em>ruined</em> it!”</p><p>“What did I ruin? Can I make it better?”</p><p>There’s a voice in his head that sounds like her friend with the powers—Daisy—and tells him he ruined her homecoming and her reunions—one in particular. The homecoming can’t be helped and he doesn’t think it would’ve gone much better without him; it’s not like him not being around would’ve made her healthier. But the reunion? The big one? He can see how he ruined that.</p><p>She clumsily twists her hand out from between his and slaps it against the side of his face. The new skin stings a little. He hasn’t had a proper shave in years and his face isn’t use to being exposed to the elements. Or to drug-addled Brits’ fingernails.</p><p>She lifts her head to regard him with all the seriousness she can muster right now. “I can’t marry you if you don’t have a beard.”</p><p>After that, Will’s not ashamed to say it takes his brain a second or two to catch up. Jemma’s stroking his bare cheek with that frown still on her face and it’s not really helping his cognitive abilities, so he closes one hand over hers to hold it in place so he can think.</p><p>She’ll probably never remember this conversation, but just in case she does, best not to make the memory more awkward than it needs to be.</p><p>“That bad, huh?”</p><p>She nods pitifully. “I had this whole picture in my head. White dress. Outdoor ceremony. Oodles of flowers.”</p><p>“Oodles?” he can’t help but echo. Never thought he’d hear Jemma say <em>oodles</em>.</p><p>She nods solemnly. “And you had a <em>beard</em>.” She tugs her hand away like she can’t stand to touch his beardless face a second longer.</p><p>“Ah. Well.” He folds his arms along the top of the bar preventing her from falling out of the bed and rests his chin on those. “If you still feel like getting married come spring, that’s plenty of time for me to grow a new beard.” He thinks. He’s not used to thinking about things like days or months or really time at all, but he’s pretty sure someone said it was September. </p><p>“Nooo,” she wails again, more angry than sad this time. “I’ll be fat in spring!”</p><p>“Oh? You plan on eating that many cheeseburgers?” He pokes her belly, figuring this means her exam went well. She flinches, covering her stomach with both hands and delivering a warning scowl that would make even that May woman jealous. “I promise I’ll love you no matter how fat you are,” he soothes.</p><p>It’s only after he’s said it he realizes his mistake. Obviously he loves Jemma. He’d be a fool not to. But actually <em>telling</em> her when she’s got her whole life waiting for her to get back to it and him not in it, that’s even dumber than not loving her at all would be.</p><p>He’ll just have to hope she forgets this part of the conversation.</p><p>“You had better.” She rolls over, putting her back to him. “It’s your fault.”</p><p>“Yeah, yeah. Everything is.” Since he’s hoping she’ll forget this anyway, he figures there’s no harm in bending over her on his way to his feet so he can kiss her hair. She hums and he chooses to take it as forgiveness.</p><p>He settles down in his own bed and listens to her breathing even out until the sound lulls him to sleep.</p><p> </p><p>-----</p><p> </p><p>Jemma wakes up with a terrible start. The nurse come to check their vitals gives her a <em>go back to sleep</em> smile and moves off to check on Will. Jemma doesn’t go back to sleep, however. She lays there in the dim light and bites back a moan. She cannot <em>believe</em> she was so monumentally stupid.</p><p>She should have told Bobbi to keep her in the labs for observation—or at least until she wasn’t half-drunk on completely useless anesthetics. Better yet, Bobbi should have known better than to leave her alone in the room she shares with Will. A good friend, the kind who wouldn’t lie and betray her, would have.</p><p>But that’s unkind. It isn’t Bobbi’s fault Jemma’s tongue got away from her. No, it’s only Jemma’s.</p><p>The nurse slips out the door, quiet as she came, and Jemma puts her hands to her face so she can finally release that moan.</p><p>“Hey.”</p><p>Bollocks.</p><p>“You want me to call her back?” Will asks. From the sound of it, he’s contorted himself to lean half out of his bed to check on her and when she turns her head that is exactly what she finds.</p><p>She folds her hands on her breast. “No. No, I’m all right.”</p><p>“Uh huh.”</p><p>His eyes travel from her head to her feet and back again, searching for the source of her distress. She can feel the pass of his gaze like a touch and imagines, when it lands on said source, it lingers there longer than it truly does. But there’s no new understanding in his eyes when they meet hers again, only the same knowing as before, the one that says he knows her too well to believe her lies.</p><p>It’s unfair, really. The others accept her half-truths easily and they’ve all known her much longer than Will. They may not <em>believe</em> her precisely, but they accept that when she says she’s all right she means she <em>will be</em> all right. She’ll hold herself together as she always has and by pretending she will ultimately force her body and her emotions in line with her will.</p><p>But the man named Will is not so easily persuaded.</p><p>He can’t stare for more than a few seconds before the weight of his disbelief overpowers her. She sits up, curling her legs beneath her so that she can face him properly. He sits up as well, plainly distressed.</p><p>“Should you be doing that?”</p><p>His question is like a bucket of cold water. “Why do you say that?” she asks while inside she’s asking herself a much more frantic <em>what did you say?</em> Even while he answers her mind is reaching back through the muddle the drugs left of her memory in search of the details of their earlier conversation.</p><p>“I’m not gonna pretend I know what all they did to you—and I don’t want to—but I wouldn’t think your insides would thank you for moving around like that so soon.”</p><p>Oh. Oh thank heavens. He thinks she had the exploratory procedure done.</p><p>The fact that he thinks that, of course, begs a few questions. Such as why her team allowed him to go on thinking that?</p><p>But perhaps she’s being ungenerous again. It’s true that the team are plainly no fans of Will’s, but it can also be true they wanted to allow her to decide when and how to tell him.</p><p>“There was no procedure,” she says. “There were some routine blood tests to be run before they began. The results determined the cause, so it was called off.”</p><p>Will frowns at that. Without the beard, it changes his face. She’ll have to relearn his expressions now; the thought leaves her feeling oddly eager, like when she has an experiment to run.</p><p>“They had already begun to administer the anesthetic,” she explains.</p><p>“Are you okay?” Of course that’s his first question. She’s really not surprised.</p><p>She slips out of her bed and to his side, taking his hands in hers. “What did I say? While I was drugged?”</p><p>His fingers flinch in hers. “It doesn’t matter…”</p><p>“But it does. Did I tell you anything?”</p><p>His mouth quirks up on one side. She knows his wry smile, but not this new, more open version. She’s so wrapped up in the study of it, she’s surprised when he finally speaks.</p><p>“You were angry I shaved.”</p><p>She can’t say she’s happy with the <em>outcome</em>, but she’s not sorry he got the chance to cut off the physical reminder of his lost years. She’s already taken scissors to the extra inches of hair she grew on the planet.</p><p>“That was all?” Her memory is still muddled, but she has the distinct impression she said something she ought to be regretting.</p><p>He rolls his eyes up to the ceiling the way he so often does when he’s thinking <em>did you have to send me </em><em><b>her</b></em><em> of all people?</em></p><p>“You said you couldn’t marry me without beard.”</p><p>Jemma’s hands go limp around his and it’s a good thing he’s still holding on or she might just sway back until she hits the floor—or more likely the bar on the edge of her bed.</p><p>“But like I said,” he’s quick to add, “it doesn’t matter. You were drugged and out of it and-”</p><p>“And we can’t wait until spring,” she says, the memories solidifying now he’s given her the key. “Because I’ll be too fat.”</p><p>His hands are still strong around hers, anchoring her, but she can tell he’s struggling. “I meant what I said.”</p><p>With the strict hydration regimen they’re both on, her body has ample water to spare for a few tears. She closes her eyes on them and on the memory. He loves her. Oh, it is completely unfair that she had to hear him say it when she wasn’t herself enough to enjoy it.</p><p>“But you don’t have to-”</p><p>“I love you too,” she says swiftly, before he can ruin it with some ridiculous—and unnecessary—hedging. She brings his hands up to her lips to kiss his knuckles. “I love you. More every day.”</p><p>“Oh.”</p><p>He looks utterly shell-shocked. A bit like when he found her still in the cage, but happier. More open not only in his expression, but in his joy. He’s coming back to life, her Will.</p><p>She thinks what she has to say next will help with that more than anything.</p><p>“But there’s more. Something I have to tell you.” Now. Before she loses her nerve.</p><p>“Bad news?” he asks, though he’s smiling. He’s teasing her.</p><p>But she hopes it’s not. “We never talked about it—we’ve hardly even begun.”</p><p>This feels too fast. And somehow just right. All those months together, everything they went through, what does the normal course of events have to do with them? She’s eager to begin the next phase of her life—the <em>best</em> phase, she hopes—and she hopes she knows Will well enough that she’s right he’ll be eager too.</p><p>She holds his hands tight and meets his eyes, wanting him to see and feel precisely now happy she is. “I’m pregnant.”</p><p>His fingers twitch again. His expression freezes before going slowly slack. And the rest of him follows, sinking down onto the bed so he can stare up at the ceiling.</p><p>“Pregnant,” he echoes.</p><p>“Yes.”</p><p>“A baby.”</p><p>“Yes, that is generally what that means.”</p><p>His hands slide out of hers to cover his face and she waits. For about five seconds before she can’t take it anymore.</p><p>“Will?”</p><p>He doesn’t move. Barely even <em>breathes</em> from what she can see.</p><p>She lowers the railing on his bed and climbs in, nestling herself against his side. With her head over his heart, she can hear it beating. It’s as reassuring now as it was that first night she let herself find comfort in his arms.</p><p>“I know it’s not what you’re good at,” she says, “but I need you to talk to me.”</p><p>He doesn’t, not right away, but what he does is almost better. He lowers one arm to reach across his chest and catch her shoulder, squeezing it tight and holding her in place so that she knows before he drops the other that he doesn’t want her to move away. It’s awkward with how she’s positioned herself, but he manages to make them both comfortable with his hands are tight on her hip and shoulder, keeping her close. It’s a good sign.</p><p>“I wanna be that guy,” he says slowly. “I keep telling myself I gotta be ready. To say goodbye. To leave so that you can have your happily ever after already-”</p><p>“Will, <em>no</em>.” She sees right away what’s happened and tries to sit up so she can look him in the eye and tell him that he’s <em>wrong</em>. But his hand on her shoulder is firm, refusing to let her move. When she relents, he pats it gently in apology. Her hand fists in his scrub top and her chin digs into his ribs, holding him to her. “You are <em>not</em> a consolation prize. I love <em>you</em>. And I wouldn’t be able to have any happily ever after if you left me, baby or no baby. All right?”</p><p>He nods and she can feel him let out a slow breath. “Good. That- that’s good. Because I don’t know if I could. Baby or no baby.”</p><p>She loosens her hold on his shirt and takes up trailing her fingers over his chest. “Is that so?”</p><p>“There are things-” He stops and she can hear him swallow. His voice is thick when he continues. “A life, really. A kind of life that I stopped letting myself want. Because I thought-” He laughs wetly. “I was in Hell. Alone. Hopeless. I thought I’d lost my chance, you know?”</p><p>She does. Not just because she had to face that loss along with a million others the day the bottle broke, but because of her job. She’s wondered more than once since the uprising if her duty to the world at large was worth sacrificing any chance she might have at a simple life with a family and a love of her own. It’s a noble sacrifice to be sure, but she’s learned too much about herself lately to pretend she can make it.</p><p>He sighs out another wet laugh. “And then you showed up.”</p><p>She tips her head up to kiss his bare jaw and pretends she doesn’t taste the salt clinging to his skin.</p><p>“I feel the same way,” she says. “And-” she lets out a heavy sigh- “I suppose if you really prefer it, I could marry a beardless man.”</p><p>He releases her shoulder to drag his hand over his chin and neck. “Actually, it’s kinda freaking me out. I think I’m gonna regrow it.”</p><p>“Really?” She doesn’t sound <em>too</em> eager about that, does she? She never even <em>liked</em> men with beards before and now look at her.</p><p>“On one condition.”</p><p>“You just said you miss the beard, why do <em>I</em> get conditions when it’s something- ow!” While they’ve been talking, Will has been slowly worming his fingers beneath the elastic waist of her scrubs. She assumed for erotic reasons but now he’s gone and pinched her.</p><p>“My one condition,” he says firmly, “is that I get to propose.”</p><p>Oh, he is ridiculous. “We just agreed we’re going to get married.”</p><p>“Once I have a beard again. That gives me at least a month. And I want a romantic, knock-your-socks-off proposal. The ring, the knee, the whole thing. I get to do it.”</p><p>How can she argue with that? She nestles more comfortably into his side. “When did you become such a romantic?”</p><p>He strokes his fingers over the spot he pinched. “My dad always said a man figures the romance thing out when he finds the right woman.”</p><p>“Must have been some woman.”</p><p>“Oh yeah.” He nods and she can feel his chin brush her hair. “That May is something else.”</p><p>It’s a good thing Will’s holding her or Jemma might just laugh herself off the bed. But he is and he will. For now and always. Her happily ever after.</p><p> </p>
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